The United States and eight other countries on Monday welcomed Mexico to join negotiations for the TPP pact (The Trans-Pacific Partnership), but continued to mull over Canada and Japan’s seven-month-old bids to join the talks for the Asia Pacific free trade agreement, Reuters reported.
The decision to accept Mexico’s application was jointly made by the nine countries currently negotiating the  – the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Peru, Chile, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam and Brunei, U.S. officials said.

Until this week, NAFTA partners Mexico and Canada had been unable to meet conditions needed to join the talks, according to The Hill.
The U.S. had pressured Mexico to resolve issues related to the beef and potato trade as well as to intellectual property protection. The U.S. also wanted Mexico to agree on negotiating labor and environmental provisions which are not in NAFTA, the Hill reported.